I'm new to XBMC and am trying it out to see if it would be suitable to replace a Boxee Box. I have the current stable release of XBMC (Frodo 12.2). It is running on a Windows 7 (64 bit) machine. My video library is on a NAS and XBMC is accessing the shares via NFS. I'm using the default skin at the moment. All of my TV shows, episodes and movies have NFO files and local thumbnails to deal with Boxee limitations. I thought I would keep these given the amount of work that went into getting the right. And in some cases I have my own custom ordering of seasons or episodes that don't conform to online sources like the TVDB.
Most shows have scanned correctly. A few aren't scanning and one is only scanning a single episode. One example of a show that isn't scanning is "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". It appears in my list of TV shows with fanart and folder image but no episodes are listed.
I've noticed that all of the shows where the episodes are not scanning correctly don't follow the XBMC naming convention. But, I thought the purpose of NFO files was to tell XBMC what was there and consequently file names shouldn't be important. The same thing happens with DVD extras. Where I have a file name that conforms to the XBMC naming convention of 0xNN - Name.avi XBMC is picking it up and adding it to specials for that show. When I don't follow that naming convention XBMC is ignoring the files.
Am I correct in assuming it may be the file names causing the issue? Is there a way of getting XBMC to read NFO files and pick up episodes if they don't follow the XBMC naming convention?
The curious exception is for Doctor Who (2005). XBMC is picking up a single episode which happens to have the format (1080) at the end of its file name, so XBMC is picking up that episode as being season 10 episode 80.
If it helps I've included the contents of a sample tvshow.nfo file and an episode NFO file below.
The tvshow.nfo file contains:
An example episode NFO file (Episode 1.nfo) contains:
Most shows have scanned correctly. A few aren't scanning and one is only scanning a single episode. One example of a show that isn't scanning is "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". It appears in my list of TV shows with fanart and folder image but no episodes are listed.
I've noticed that all of the shows where the episodes are not scanning correctly don't follow the XBMC naming convention. But, I thought the purpose of NFO files was to tell XBMC what was there and consequently file names shouldn't be important. The same thing happens with DVD extras. Where I have a file name that conforms to the XBMC naming convention of 0xNN - Name.avi XBMC is picking it up and adding it to specials for that show. When I don't follow that naming convention XBMC is ignoring the files.
Am I correct in assuming it may be the file names causing the issue? Is there a way of getting XBMC to read NFO files and pick up episodes if they don't follow the XBMC naming convention?
The curious exception is for Doctor Who (2005). XBMC is picking up a single episode which happens to have the format (1080) at the end of its file name, so XBMC is picking up that episode as being season 10 episode 80.
If it helps I've included the contents of a sample tvshow.nfo file and an episode NFO file below.
The tvshow.nfo file contains:
Code:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<tvshow xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
<title>The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy</title>
<tvdbid>78142</tvdbid>
<rating>8.4</rating>
<genre>Comedy, Sci-Fi</genre>
<mpaa>TV-PG</mpaa>
<premiered>1981-01-05</premiered>
<studio>BBC Two</studio>
<plot>Don't Panic! This tells the story of Arthur Dent, an average Englishman who life was spared by his friend, who turned out to be an alien, while the planet Earth is destroyed. His friend tells him about the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a guide with anything you ever needed, and wanted to know. They travel across the galaxy, meeting friendly, and not so friendly characters in order to find the great question (the answer being 42).</plot>
<actor>
<name>Simon Jones</name>
<role>Arthur Dent</role>
<thumb>http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMjE5NzE2NzA2OV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMzEyNjI2NA@@._V1._SY314_CR62,0,214,314_.jpg</thumb>
</actor>
<actor>
<name>Peter Jones</name>
<role>The Book</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
<actor>
<name>David Dixon</name>
<role>Ford Prefect</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
<actor>
<name>David Learner</name>
<role>Marvin</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
<actor>
<name>Mark Wing-Davey</name>
<role>Zaphod Beeblebrox</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
<actor>
<name>Sandra Dickinson</name>
<role>Trillian</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
<actor>
<name>Stephen Moore</name>
<role>Marvin</role>
<thumb />
</actor>
</tvshow>An example episode NFO file (Episode 1.nfo) contains:
Code:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<episodedetails>
<title>Episode 1</title>
<runtime>32</runtime>
<aired>1981-01-05</aired>
<rating>8.5</rating>
<season>1</season>
<episode>1</episode>
<plot>Arthur Dent, a perfectly ordinary Earthman, is surprised to wake up one day to find bulldozers outside his house with orders to knock it down to build a by-pass. He is even more surprised later on in the pub when his best friend Ford Prefect reveals himself to be from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse. The two are forced to hitch a lift on one of the advancing Vogon spacecraft which proceed to blow up the Earth to make way for an interspace bypass.
Our two heroes find themselves trapped in a storage room in hyperspace, with only a menacing Vogon guard for company.</plot>
<credits>Terry Duran (Guest Star) / George Cornelius (Guest Star) / Douglas Adams (Guest Star) / Steve Trainer (Guest Star) / Bill Barnsley (Guest Star) / Steve Conway (Guest Star) / Cleo Rocos (Guest Star) / Andrew Mussell (Guest Star) / Martin Benson (Guest Star) / Joe Melia (Guest Star) / David Grahame (Guest Star) / Douglas Adams (Writer)</credits>
<director>Alan J. W. Bell</director>
<streamdetails>
<audio>
<channels>2</channels>
<codec>ac3</codec>
</audio>
<audio>
<channels>2</channels>
<codec>ac3</codec>
</audio>
<video>
<aspect>1.333</aspect>
<codec>v_mpeg2</codec>
<duration>32</duration>
<height>576</height>
<scantype>Interlaced</scantype>
<width>720</width>
</video>
</streamdetails>
</fileinfo>
</episodedetails>
